5.29.2015

(JTA) – Two synagogues and the homes of countless Jewish residents were damaged in the floods that swept through Houston on Monday and into Tuesday, inundating homes and businesses, sweeping away cars and leaving at least five people dead.

These final days leading up to the geulah shleimah are very
difficult. This period of time, known as
chevlei Mashiach, is and will be so terrible that some of our Sages said “Let him come, but let
me not see him” (Sanhedrin 98b). Everyone
is suffering physically, emotionally and mentally. The keys to surviving this time and, be’ezrat Hashem, greeting Mashiach are
bitahon and emunah. We need to
take every opportunity to strengthen ourselves in these two areas.

The essence of bitahon--the mitzva of trust and
confidence in Hashem—is to know that everything comes from Hashem. True, we engage--and we are commanded to
engage--in activities directed towards achieving certain results in the
physical world. But we must realize that
these actions are not the true causes of the results which seem to flow from
them. The true cause is always the will
of Hashem. We are instructed to pursue
economic and medical activities and so on, only in order to disguise this basic
fact. If it was obvious that everything
came directly from Hashem, there would be too little scope for behira.

NO MORE WORRY

A person who sees the world in these terms and has
perfect faith that everything (except behira—“moral choices”) comes from Hashem
will never succumb to worry. He knows
that Hashem has already decided the amount of worldly goods he needs for his
spiritual service and there is, therefore, nothing to worry about. A person only worries about a situation which
he thinks he can change. If the outcome
is accepted as inevitable, a person may be apprehensive, but he does not
worry. This is why people are not
normally worried about the fact that they are going to die. A person who knows that all that happens to
him comes from Hashem and nothing he does in the physical sphere can possible
change it has no cause to worry.

Shabbat is given to us to help us absorb this truth. On Shabbat, we desist from practical activity
to remind ourselves that this kind of activity has no causative effect. We should see the reality of the spiritual
within the physical and dedicate all our activity to Hashem: “It is a Shabbat for Hashem your God.”

When the Torah says “six days you shall labor and do all
your work,” our Rabbis say this means that when Shabbat enters, “it shall be as
if all our work were done.” Even if a person is faced with a great worry, when
Shabbat comes in his worry should evaporate.
How can this happen? Because he
has already worked on himself to recognize and understand that Hashem is the
sole cause of all that happens. Secure
in this knowledge, he will trust in Hashem’s goodness and feel confident that
Hashem has already prepared everything so that the outcome will be the best
possible outcome for him. Shabbat will
be the test. If his worries truly
evaporate with the onset of Shabbat, it is clear that he has internalized this
lesson. He no longer worries about what
he did or might have done during the week, or what might happen next week, but
places his trust in Hashem above. (Strive for Truth, Rabbi Eliyahu E. Dessler)

May all of Am Yisrael have a wonderful Shabbat and merit to
receive the geulah shleimah speedily in our days.

5.15.2015

If you will follow My decrees and observe My commandments
and perform them; then I will provide your rains in their time, and the land
will give its produce and the tree of the field will give its fruit.

Vayikra 26:14-18

But if you will not listen to Me and will not perform all
of these commandments; If you consider My decrees loathsome, and if your being
rejects My ordinances, so as not to perform all My commandments, so that you
annul My covenant—then I will do the same to you; I will assign upon you panic,
swelling lesions, and burning fever, which cause eyes to long and souls to
suffer; you will sow your seeds in vain for your enemies will eat it. I will turn My attention against you, you
will be struck down before enemies; those who hate you will subjugate you—you will
flee with no one pursuing you. If despite this you do not heed Me, then I shall
punish you further, seven ways for your sins.

Anti-semitism is one of the tools Hashem uses to punish us. Harav Naftali Hoffner explains it clearly in
his book Our Faith, Our Strength;

COMMUNAL PUNISHMENT

63. ANTISEMITISM AND ITS SIGNIFICANCE

a. The real reason for anti-Semitism (which would seem to
be completely unjustified) is clearly explained by the following Midrash (in
connection with what happened before the exodus from Egypt): “When Yoseph died,
they [i.e.the children of Israel] did away with the Brith Milah
Mitzvah, claiming lets be like the
Egyptians!

…Because of this the Almighty turned the affection which
the Eyptians had for Israel into hatred as it says: ‘He turned their heart to
hate His nation, to plot against His servants’”

b. Likewise in our times, in reaction to the tendency of
a considerable section of our people to be ‘like the other nations’ (a process
which starts with ignoring the Mitzvoth – and gradually moves toward
assimilation and intermarriage with the goyim) we are faced by communal
punishment (according to the measure –for- measure principle) of anti-Semitism (which
impedes assimilation).

c. The purpose of communal punishment is-- to serve as a
clear warning to all of us to improve our ways, before our situation
deteriorates further. Note: for instance, when the Nazi regime came to power in
Germany more than 60 years ago (then according to the ‘measure-for-measure’):

1. During the first month of power, they prohibited all
mixed marriages between Jews and non-Jews (at the time, the rate of such
marriages had reached 50% in some places!!).

2. About 2 months after he seized power, on April 1st,
’33, which fell on a Shabath, he ordered SA-guards to stand at the entrance of
each Jewish-owned store, open on that Shabath, to warn any potential customer
that the store was owned by a Jew and should therefore be boycotted. –There could
have been no clearer warning against the desecration of the Shabath!!

I don’t think anyone is unaware of the increase in antisemitism
around the world in the past decade. However, I think most are unaware of the
increase in interfaith relations in the same time period and their correlation. It is shocking to me how many Jews believe interfaith
dialogue, breaking down the walls of separation between Jew and non-Jew and
building bridges between “faith communities” is the solution to anti-semitism
when it is actually one of the causes. After
all, they say, there is really no difference between us and them and once we
show them this, peace will reign in the world.

The most disturbing part of this issue are the so-called “religious”
Jews, even Rabbis, that are not only involved in this interfaith movement but
leading it. They have put a new spin on
things. Instead of assimilating amongst
the goyim, they are trying to assimilate the goyim amongst Am Yisrael. They may be able to fool some people with their
righteous claim of being “a light to the nations” but Hashem is not
fooled. The goal is the same: to mingle
and become one with the goyim (by making the goyim into quasi-Jews) and to
destroy Judaism (by corrupting halachah or claiming it is no longer relevant at
all and infusing Torah with foreign ideas and philosophies).

These xian loving Jews disregard the halachah, the ways of
our forefathers and the words of our sages regarding relations with non-Jews. They are new Jews and their Judaism is all
about love and tolerance and becoming one with the goyim. They
have traded our covenant with Hashem for a covenant with the goyim. We are to be “ovdei Hashem”, but they are more
focused on the religious experience they get from Judaism than serving and obeying Hashem . These Jews take
the exalted mission our people to be a nation of priests who serve Hashem and
have degraded it into being a nation whose purpose is to serve the goyim. Of
course in reality these Jews only serve themselves . We are taught to fear Hashem, to obey Hashem
andto be in awe of Hashem.

These Jews do
not fear Hashem or they would never be able to reduce Judaism, Torah, Shabbat
and our sacred relationship to Hashem to a “religious experience” as the latest
high to be marketed to the masses.

In this week’s parsha, Bechukotai, Vayikra 26:21,

If you behave casually with Me and refuse to heed Me,
then I shall lay a further blow upon you—seven ways like your sins.

In the commentary it is written;

קרי Casually. The translation
follows Rashi’s primary interpretation according to Sifra. It means that despite the punishments, your
performance of the commandments will be haphazard and erratic; you will treat
them as a matter of choice and convenience, rather than as divinely imposed
obligations.

These people "celebrate" Shabbat and what they get from it, they do not "observe" Shabbat as commanded by the Almighty.

Hashem is loving and merciful but he is not a liar. He will punish us for our sins as he said in this weeks parsha. It is just a matter of time. Do teshuva now before it is too late.

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"The argument of the nations here is that we must achieve unity and break down the walls of separation. Is this not fair and logical according the the false thinking of the worshippers of foriegn culture? Is not the unity of all nations and the disappearance of the differences between Israel and the nations the goal of the Hellenists...."

"G-d decreed upon holy Israel that they must be separated from impurity and from the impure nations. The idolatry and foreign culture of the nations cannot coexist with G-d's Torah or with G-d himself."